What the latest GOP Ransom note looks like

"In theory, this could give House Republicans time to reject the Senate bill, push another far-right alternative, and practically guarantee a shutdown, but all evidence suggests that's unlikely. As National Journal reported, "Conservative Republicans in the House appear ready to back off their demands that the short-term funding resolution Congress must pass to avoid a government shutdown also defund or delay Obamacare."

So, for those hoping congressional Republicans don't shut down the government, this is good news, right? On the surface, yes. Based on overnight developments, a shutdown appears less likely than it did a few days ago.

The problem is, as the Washington Post and others are reporting, GOP lawmakers appear eager to trade one hostage for another -- and the next hostage crisis will be far more serious.

With federal agencies set to close their doors in five days, House Republicans began exploring a potential detour on the path to a shutdown: shifting the fight over President Obama's health-care law to a separate bill that would raise the nation's debt limit.

If it works, the strategy could clear the way for the House to approve a simple measure to keep the government open into the new fiscal year, which will begin Tuesday, without hotly contested provisions to defund the Affordable Care Act.

But it would set the stage for an even more nerve-racking deadline on Oct. 17, with conservatives using the threat of the nation's first default on its debt to force the president to accept a one-year delay of the health-care law's mandates, taxes and benefits.

This is nothing short of madness, but it's nevertheless quickly become the preferred Republican plan -- the GOP is prepared to let one hostage go (they won't shut down the government), while putting a gun to a new hostage (Republicans will trash the economy on purpose unless their demands are met). All of this will play out over the next 22 days.

The next task, aside from preventing a shutdown, is filling out the details of the ransom note.

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According to the plan that GOP leaders will present to members today, Republicans will present a debt-ceiling plan "loaded with dozens" of right-wing goodies, including:

In exchange, Democrats would get ... literally nothing. And if their demands are not met, Republicans will crash the economy, push the nation into default, and trash the full faith and credit of the United States for the first time in American history.

Republicans could try to achieve these goals through the normal legislative process, but they probably realize those bills would fail to become law. So, as they abandon American governing and adopt policymaking-by-extortion, these unhinged lawmakers figure they'll just load up a must-pass bill with goodies, and threaten deliberate harm to Americans unless they get their way.

This is evidence of a political party that's gone stark raving mad. If you hear a politician or a pundit suggest this is somehow normal, or consistent with the American tradition, please know how very wrong they are.

Now tell us how much you all love the country and the Americans in it!!! You love it so much you'll shoot it in the head!

And just what exactly were you hoping in the plan?* Free condoms for sex with a minor.* Tax breaks for gay marriage.* No debt ceiling just spend like you're on a shopping spree.* More illegals in the country.* Free cans of spray paint so you can decorate a building.

You make my point idiot, there should not be any RANSOM tied to PAYING the bills we've already spent the money from!!! It's basic Governing which you have no intention of ever doing, just a sideshow of circus clowns driving a bunny bus!!

"That's baloney. The moment Washington fails to pay the people it has committed to pay, whether it be veterans, bridge repair crews or Border Patrol agents, it will call into question the federal government's reliability as a debtor. Investors would respond by demanding higher interest on government bonds, raising federal costs and widening the budget deficit. As Keith Hennessey, a former top economic advisor to President George W. Bush, put it: "It's easy to imagine a credit rating agency downgrading the U.S. for not paying contractors or states on time, even if principal and interest payments on U.S. Treasuries are all being made when they should be.... If you make your credit card payments on time but miss your rent payment three months in a row, you're probably a bad credit risk."

"House Republicans, despite winning 1.4 million fewer votes in the last election, are nevertheless in the majority, and feel justified in holding the debt ceiling hostage until their ridiculous demands are met. But what happens if, in the near future, there's a Democratic House majority and a Republican White House?

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), who was Speaker once and may yet become Speaker again, fielded an interesting question on this yesterday.

TPM asked her during a Capitol Hill press availability if she would categorically rule out threatening default by taking the debt limit hostage, as Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) is doing now.

"Yes, I would be willing to say, don't mess with the debt limit. Don't mess with the debt limit," Pelosi said. "Whatever luxury you want to be afforded to make your point, get attention -- that's a luxury we can't afford. So yes, I would say yes to that question."

I imagine there are Republicans who heard this and thought to themselves, "Sure, that's easy for Pelosi to say now, but if the roles were really reversed, she might try the same strategy. It's easy to make this promise when it's purely hypothetical."

But therein lies the point: it's not hypothetical at all and we don't have to struggle to guess whether Pelosi's promise has merit.

During the last two years of the Bush/Cheney era, Pelosi was Speaker of the House, and during that time, the debt ceiling needed to be raised three times (it was raised a total of seven times during Bush's two terms). In theory, Pelosi had an opportunity to use the debt ceiling as "leverage" to make extravagant demands -- about the war in Iraq, about health care, about taxes, about anything.

But she didn't. Neither House nor Senate Democrats were willing to hold the debt ceiling hostage, even though there was a Republican president. They did their duty and refrained from making this dangerous threat.

It's not an academic exercise about a hypothetical scenario -- we know what would happen if the roles were reversed because, just five years ago, the roles were reversed and Democrats had the good sense not to rely on extortion politics to get their way.

Indeed, we can go much further, because this doesn't just apply to Pelosi.

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Between 1968 and 1992, there was a Republican president for all but four years. Over that same period, there was a Democratic House majority literally the entire time. In how many instances did these large Democratic majorities insist that the Republican administrations meet their demands before a debt-ceiling increase could advance? Zero. It simply never happened.

This was not, by the way, a time of bipartisan Kumbaya in the nation's capital. There were many bitter, partisan fights. But Democrats understood there were some things elected U.S. officials simply could not do. Threatening the full faith and credit of the United States to get their way, putting the nation's financial wellbeing in jeopardy until unconditional demands were met, was simply considered beyond the pale.

Whining, crying, stomping your feet in a tantrum and threatening the very status of the country to get your cry baby way is not good Governence, it's irresponsible childish behavior, and you're going to be spanked big time in the next few election cycles for it, mark my words!!!!

The last time there was a two-term Democratic president, congressional Republicans had an idea on how to respond to voters' judgment: impeach him. Americans have put Bill Clinton in the White House, but Gingrich, DeLay, and their allies decided it was their job to push him out.

With this in mind, there are some parallels to contemporary politics, insofar as congressional Republicans are once again eager to replace voters' judgment with their own.

We talked earlier about the laundry list of right-wing goodies GOP lawmakers will demand Democrats provide as part of the new Republican debt-ceiling crisis. Reflecting on the wish list, Ezra Klein noted,

"John Boehner isn't even trying to pretend his House of Representatives is a sane place anymore. The House GOP's debt limit bill -- obtained by the National Review -- isn't a serious governing document. It's not even a plausible opening bid. It's a cry for help."

And while the hopeless insanity of the Republican ransom note certainly matters, Jon Chait noticed something especially interesting about the GOP's "megalomaniacal ambition."

The fact that a major party could even propose anything like this is a display of astonishing contempt for democratic norms. Republicans ran on this plan and lost by 5 million votes. They also lost the Senate and received a million fewer votes in the House but held control owing to favorable district lines. Is there an example in American history of a losing party issuing threats to force the majority party to implement its rejected agenda?

Since the U.S. Civil War? No, there are no such examples.

So, on the one hand we have Republicans like the Heritage Foundation's Jim DeMint, who wants to pretend the 2012 elections don't really count. On the other we have congressional Republicans, who think they've found a way for the GOP to present a policy platform to the nation, watch it get rejected, and then implement in anyway -- as if election results are a meager suggestion that our elected policymakers should ignore as part of an extortion scheme.

After the last Democratic president was re-elected, Republicans sought a way to undo the election. After this Democratic president was re-elected, Republicans are again looking to undo the election.

Other than our Civil War, there's just no precedent in American history for anything like this.

Regressives at their best!!!!! They want to take us back in time to a land of make believe.

Sorry, you LOST THE ELECTION by a lot, and apparently, you're combfortable there in the losing category!!!!

When someone spends as much of their precious time as you do railing against the opposition you must stop and ask yourself...who's winning the battle?

Nobody gives two cents about your opinion yet you are on here relentlessly spewing it. And you take the threads you create and post ad nauseam until some unsuspecting fool takes the bait.

Serious question, don't you have better things to do with your time? I assume you're not employed given the amount of time you post on here. So why not volunteer at a soup question or something more constructive?

How about you loud mouths answer the question, no more rabbit holes until you doWhere the F were you all when it was raised under W 7 times in 8 years?Why is it only a problem now?

Mostly because Obummer can't be trusted. Riddle me this, if Obummer care is so great why do people in Government not want it for themselves? Also just because you're a welfare mom it doesn't mean I have to be nice to you. Don't get pissy with me because your baby daddys all left you.

When someone spends as much of their precious time as you do railing against the opposition you must stop and ask yourself...who's winning the battle?Nobody gives two cents about your opinion yet you are on here relentlessly spewing it. And you take the threads you create and post ad nauseam until some unsuspecting fool takes the bait.Serious question, don't you have better things to do with your time? I assume you're not employed given the amount of time you post on here. So why not volunteer at a soup question or something more constructive?

Right, it's perfectly fine for all the 25 or so Conservatives to own the Topix threads with BS spewing left front and center but if I do it, well then it's a problem?

Those posters highjack thread after thread and turn them into Lynch bashing threads, night, day, anytime in between, but if I post some things which are actually relevant to today, oh that bothers you?

The politics of the day are important, just cause you don't like the aspects of it that I post, doesn't mean they are not relevant, what's really not relevant is your post, you don't like mine, fine, stay away.

What I'm doing is forcing these ridiculous Conservsative comments and thoughts out from hiding and getting them posted right here for all to see the lunacy, and boy am I successful at it, just read the BS that gets tried to debunk facts and reality!!

<quoted text>Mostly because Obummer can't be trusted. Riddle me this, if Obummer care is so great why do people in Government not want it for themselves? Also just because you're a welfare mom it doesn't mean I have to be nice to you. Don't get pissy with me because your baby daddys all left you.

Oh right, cause you're a hypocrit, good answer!

My response to your question: Because it is designed for people who DON'T ALREADY HAVE INSURANCE bonehead, the whole purpose is to get the 32 million uninsured coverage that's why!

And that's as much about the ACA as I'm going to say, the bill spent 25 days in Congress and was hard faught all the way, you don't like the outcome, too bad, 3 words to describe the ACA, "It's the Law"!!! And you won't ever be "repealing" it!!

<quoted text>Oh right, cause you're a hypocrit, good answer!My response to your question: Because it is designed for people who DON'T ALREADY HAVE INSURANCE bonehead, the whole purpose is to get the 32 million uninsured coverage that's why!And that's as much about the ACA as I'm going to say, the bill spent 25 days in Congress and was hard faught all the way, you don't like the outcome, too bad, 3 words to describe the ACA, "It's the Law"!!! And you won't ever be "repealing" it!!

Good points. Now if they only 'faught' as hard for an education bill you might have learned how to spell!

What I'm doing is forcing these ridiculous Conservsative comments and thoughts out from hiding and getting them posted right here for all to see the lunacy, and boy am I successful at it, just read the BS that gets tried to debunk facts and reality!!

You're doing nothing of the sort. According to your own post this board is monopolized by Conservatives. If you believe that and that's the case, you pissing into the wind. You're not going to change anyone's mind and you certainly aren't doing anything constructive with your time.

This is the best use of your time? Your time wouldn't be better spent helping the less fortunate, reading to kids at the library, volunteering at a nursing home etc? The best thing for you to do is to come on Topix and rail against the 5-8 people who disagree with your politics?

When you look back on your life will white knighting Obama and the Democrat party on Topix be one of your greatest accomplishments?

<quoted text>You're doing nothing of the sort. According to your own post this board is monopolized by Conservatives. If you believe that and that's the case, you pissing into the wind. You're not going to change anyone's mind and you certainly aren't doing anything constructive with your time.This is the best use of your time? Your time wouldn't be better spent helping the less fortunate, reading to kids at the library, volunteering at a nursing home etc? The best thing for you to do is to come on Topix and rail against the 5-8 people who disagree with your politics?When you look back on your life will white knighting Obama and the Democrat party on Topix be one of your greatest accomplishments?

You can think whatever you want about what I do with my time, you're here reading it dummy. You shoiuldn't worry about how, why i have time to do this, why is that a concern for you, are you seriously saying you GAS about how I am when I get to the upside looking down?

Give me a break.

The ownership of this Democracy is you and I, is there some part of this country that you think is a waste of time? Do you not understand we as citizens have obligations in this greatest Democracy in the world? Do you not understand how it works?

The things that get said here show all who believes what, who champions what policies that either help or hurt the citizens of this country. It's called Free Speech and you have no right to try and tell me I shouldn't "waste my time" doing it.

Worry about yourself, worry about others, do as you please, don't try and tell me what I should or shouldn't do with mine.

The Republicans are about to shut the Government down costing about a trillion in losses for the economy and the 300 million people in it and perhape even be the cause of the first ever US default and downgrading of our credit, YOU don't think this matters??????????

Everyone, left right and center agrees, we need more jobs and better growth in the economy, what happens ON MONDAY, could reverse trends of improvement and derail an already weak recovery that has already lasted too long.

Obviously Republicans have proven they have no issues threatening the well being of the whole economy and recovery for their temper tantrums, this matters to many people.

<quoted text>You can think whatever you want about what I do with my time, you're here reading it dummy. You shoiuldn't worry about how, why i have time to do this, why is that a concern for you, are you seriously saying you GAS about how I am when I get to the upside looking down?Give me a break.The ownership of this Democracy is you and I, is there some part of this country that you think is a waste of time? Do you not understand we as citizens have obligations in this greatest Democracy in the world? Do you not understand how it works?The things that get said here show all who believes what, who champions what policies that either help or hurt the citizens of this country. It's called Free Speech and you have no right to try and tell me I shouldn't "waste my time" doing it.Worry about yourself, worry about others, do as you please, don't try and tell me what I should or shouldn't do with mine.The Republicans are about to shut the Government down costing about a trillion in losses for the economy and the 300 million people in it and perhape even be the cause of the first ever US default and downgrading of our credit, YOU don't think this matters??????????

Sure it matters. But you're accomplishing zilch by posting on Topix. I've said that a couple of times. If you honestly think you're accomplishing anything that's not self-serving than you're delusional. Your posts are like Lynch's, he's not going to garner a single vote posting his nonsense. You're not going to change one mind out here on Topix with your posts. So why not do something more constructive with your time?

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